Consultancy: Gender Specialist, UNICEF - MENA Region

Strengthen Gender-Responsive in Humanitarian Action In nine affected countries in the on-going conflicts in the region

LOCATION/DURATION: MENA Region

Duration:  33 weeks (230 days) throughout the duration October 15, 2017 to September 30^th, 2018

Location:

Off-site working days: 70

Field Missions including Travel: 160

Estimated Start Date: October 15, 2017

Estimated end Date: September 30^th, 2018

 

BACKGROUND

The Middle East and North Africa region continues to face multiple and complex conflicts. The crisis in Syria entered its 7^th year, with more than 13.5 million people in need of assistance including 5.8 million children. The conflict in Yemen has left 17.1 million food-insecure people in Yemen - 7.3 million of them in need of emergency food assistance to survive. The conflict in Iraq left the country with 11.3 million population in need and more than 3million internally displaced. While men and boys are also victims of conflict and face specific challenges, the pre-existing gender inequalities and discrimination that women and girls face, increase their vulnerability and leave them disproportionately and differentially impacted by humanitarian crisis.

Women and girls remain at higher risk of GBV, particularly domestic violence, sexual violence and exploitation, child marriage, and human trafficking. Humanitarian needs are also pronounced for the increasing number of female-headed households due to losses of life of family members and limited access to income-generation and aid opportunities.

Gender-responsive humanitarian action aims for a better understanding the situation by taking into account gender-dimensions, facilitates the design of more appropriate responses, highlights opportunities and resources within an affected community, and can provide a link between humanitarian assistance and long-term development. 

Accountability to Affected Populations (AAP)is ”An active commitment to use power responsibly by taking account of, giving account to, and being held to account by the people humanitarian organizations seek to assist”. 

In line with UNICEF’s commitment to IASC's principle, UNICEF is accountable to Affected Populations through ensuring  safe, appropriate and equitable opportunities for girls, boys, women and men of all ages and abilities to decide on their humanitarian priorities,  delivery mechanisms, more over to enable them to participate in all programmatic and implementation cycles.

Preventing and responding to various forms of GBViE is recognized as a life-saving measure and an essential component of humanitarian action. Addressing GBViE is one of UNICEF’s institutional gender equality priorities.

 

Capacity to integrate gender in humanitarian programme in MENA needs to be strengthened in terms of analysis and designing and implementing programmatic interventions.  UNICEF GEROS meta-analysis 2015 concludes that UNICEF is approaching UN SWAP commitments with regard to integration of gender equality, but significant scope remains for enhancing the use of gender analysis in developing findings, conclusions & recommendations.

 

OBJECTIVE:

UNICEF MENARO is seeking this consultancy to review humanitarian action efforts and provide technical support to countries offices affected by humanitarian crisis with specific reference to strengthening the integration of gender in humanitarian analysis, planning and responses at all levels. 

The key objectives of the initiative are to:

 

• An overview of gender responsiveness in MENARO humanitarian response plans across at all levels including; programmes analysis, SITANs, humanitarian need overviews, risk analysis, programme target, design, delivery , monitoring and reporting is developed with trend analysis over the period 2015-2017
• Evidence around the impact of emergency on gender and social barriers will also be distilled from the review process
• In-country field missions to countries in humanitarian context conducted to systemically integrate and apply gender sensitive/responsive programming into their humanitarian action and strengthen accountability for affected population mechanisms with gender lenses at national and regional level (at least 6 countries)
• On-the-job, tailored training conducted for key country sectoral staff engaged in humanitarian response (at least 6 countries)
• Developing guidance/ tools for effective programming in selected sectors as per the needs identified through the field missions
• Develop Gender sensitive monitoring and evaluation tool which include minimum package of indicators for gender-responsive humanitarian programming

 

DESCRIPTION OF ASSIGNMENT:

Under the supervision of Regional Gender Advisor, and in collaboration with Regional Emergency Advisor and in close coordination with the head of country offices and relevant sector leads, a dedicated Gender Specialist will be deployed to work with UNICEF Reginal Office for a period of eleven months.

The consultant will provide support to at least six out of the nine country offices affected by conflict in MENARO mainly (Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Palestine).

Selection of the country offices will be decided in consultation between gender and the humanitarian teams at regional office and will be based on the request from country offices. Moreover, the selection will also responds to gender capacity gaps which will be identified through MENARO HR skill analysis exercise (which will be ready by Dec 2017)

The deliverables will be aligned in three phases:

 

Phase one: At regional level – duration 2 months (40 working days- Home Based)

1. Regional Overview, and programme analysis and trends

Over two months, the consultant will undertake desk review of humanitarian need assessments/planning/reporting documents in six countries. He/she will assess whether gender is integrated into all levels of program’s cycle (need assessments, analysis, planning, monitoring and reporting), assess if humanitarian programming is promoting equality through appropriate programme design, if accountability to affected population mechanisms are in place to engage women and girls and if humanitarian responses provide link to long term development and transformative agenda. The consultant will also distil any evidence around the impact of emergency on gender and social barriers.

Tasks include:

• Review relevant documents such as; need assessments, Resilience Plans, HAC, funding appeals, HNOs, SITANs, work plans, programming standards & guidelines, monitoring tools, gender marker tracking, progress and annual reports, resource mobilization, and any other relevant documents. (review regional and  country level documents)
• Distil any evidence around the impact of emergency (including outbreaks) on gender equality and social barriers
• Desk review of current practices/approaches on gender mainstreaming, including framework and guiding principles around developing performance measurement of aid investments and how are these linked to resilience building and developmental agenda
• Conduct a trend analysis of gender responsiveness through review of documents for the last three years (as applicable for some countries )
• Develop a regional overview of current status of gender equality programming in Humanitarian Action response and provide recommendations for improving programming across all sectors beyond GBV response.

      The regional overview to also reflect on

1. 1. Country Offices specific recommendations to improve response and contribution to gender equality
   2. Provide recommendation for capacity needs at country and regional levels
   3. Recommendations to integrate gender perspectives into monitoring, reporting, and result tracking systems as applicable
   4. Institutional lessons learned (successes and weaknesses of the process; successes and weaknesses related to gender integration)
   5. Recommendations for improving management, logistics or other administrative aspects of the work included in the consultancy
   6. Develop advocacy brief to support communication efforts at Regional level (see below)
2. Evidence-based Advocacy and Communication:

• Develop evidence-based advocacy and communication brief for key actors to integrate gender in all strategic humanitarian planning and transition to recovery and development. (targeting UN , Donors , NGO and government partners )
• Develop relevant advocacy and communication/information materials to address gender equality issues, including support to HC/RC advocacy efforts based on evidence. 
• Identify good / potential good examples of work across all sectors and recommend at least four good practices for documentation

The consultant will work in close coordination with the region and country offices to have all needed documents

At the end of the two months, consultant to deliver preliminary analytical and comparative report, covering trends, gaps and needs, this report will be updated for a second time when finishing the visits to the country offices.

 

Phase two at country level – duration 7.5 months (150 working days) -25 days / country (work +reporting)

Field level technical assistance and capacity building support to country offices

 

During his/her assignment, the consultant will travel to minimum six countries (depends on visa, security and as per country request), and in each country, he/she will work closely with office management, gender focal points and sectors leads.

Tasks include:

• Develop a country specific gender gap analysis in programming (mainly: risk analysis, preparedness, planning and response) – based on the earlier review of key documents
• In consultation with country office management, and sectoral programmes, Identify priority areas for gender programming beyond GBViE (that address a significant gender gap) across the different sectors
• Interact with sectoral programmes and provide on job support in developing gender mainstreaming strategy and action plan and support  designing and implementation programmes for those priority areas identified
  • Identify field level gaps in integrating gender across the preparedness and response continuum (including in the situation analysis, sector strategies, results , budgeting & reporting)
  • Map the availability and utilization of existing sectoral guidance /tools to support effective programming (global, regional or CO tools) and identify areas which require further guidance
  • Map community influencers and identify community based approaches to address gender and social norm barriers
  • Map existing AAP mechanisms and identify opportunities to modify /develop new mechanisms with gender lenses
  • Review humanitarian monitoring and evaluation mechanism in place and advice on integrating gender at all levels of results (inputs, outputs and outcome areas) for all sectors
  • Support the office to ensure that gender is systematically institutionalized and linked to development and transformative agenda
  • Review the interlinkages / partnerships / coordination  of UNICEF gender related programming with other actors (UN , Government, NGO …) 
  • Contribute to the development and maintenance of knowledge networks and practices on mainstreaming gender into humanitarian response and recovery contexts
  • Review office processes to ensure effective gender responsive humanitarian preparedness and response ( Recruitment, Resources, PCA processes, Supply …etc )
• In countries where UNICEF is leading specific clusters, the consultant will provide support for the sector coordinator to assess gender work of the cluster and improve gender responsive coordination mechanisms (at least one cluster in each country )
• Identify potential programmes that would benefit from better inclusion of gender consideration
• Facilitate a country tailored 3 day training for key sectoral/emergency (at least 2 staff from each sector of health, education, WASH, Nutrition, protection, M&E, social protection & communication 16 staff/CO). Country  offices will facilitate the training logistics
• The consultant to provide detailed report on country mission.

 

The Country office will evaluate the technical support provided based on format prepared at RO leve

 

Phase Three: Adaptation/development of tools at regional level - duration 2months (40 working days) 10 days RO based and 30 days home based

1. Develop sectoral library tools

At the end of field visit and training sessions in each country, consultant is expected to establish resource library that contain:

• Compile gender related baseline information and sex and age disaggregated data
• Compile resources library of all tools used and applicable to MENA during conflicts, material might include (training material and tools, programming, monitoring, reporting tools, in addition to special tools for resource mobilization and funding appeals)
• Develop gender in humanitarian related indicators tool for use by sectors in needs assessments, activities and monitoring and reporting efforts
• In coordination with Knowledge Management  unit and Humanitarian Team  at RO level , to create a system whereby gender data/analysis is embedded in the existing data collection tools ((e.g. HPM)
• Support RO in developing / adapting of at least 2 sectoral programming tools. (Could be specific tools in education, health, WASH, protection or social protection but also could be in management or resource mobilization …etc.

This consultancy will support specific products for MENA and contribute to UNICEF's global learning on gender integration in humanitarian context.

2. Capacity building and Institutional Consolidation to regional office

As part of the capacity building component, consultant will support Regional Office in adapt/develop training material on gender mainstreaming, in addition to deliver 3-4 days ToT training for regional staff who are working in emergency context, tasks include:

• Adapt/Develop core training module on gender integration in humanitarian work (across different sectors) in close coordination with regional office and based on training experiences from the different countries.
• Deliver 3-4- days ToT training- to the reginal staff nearly 15 staff from different sectors who are working the humanitarian field
• Submit final workshop report

Regional office will support the logistical preparation for the regional workshop and the consultant will work closely with regional office to arrange and deliver training.

 

KEY DELIVERABLES:

1. Preliminary and Final comparative and analytical report including institutional lessons learned.
2. Evidence-based advocacy and communication brief
3. Designed /refine gender related tools including :

• Gender sensitive monitoring and evaluation tools including developing gender-sensitive minimum indicators for gender-responsive humanitarian programming
• Two programming / management tools.
• Updated and develop new capacity building/training tools and update the existing tools to be more gender responsive;

4. Conducted field level technical support for 6 countries within the region including organizing office based training and Submit country specific support report
5. Organize a regional TOT training.

 

Key deliverables-Time frame-Payment

Regional Preliminary analytical and comparative report, covering trends, gaps , needs and lessons learnt -

15^th Dec. 2017 -25%

Evidence-based advocacy and communication brief--

Country field level technical support and reporting for first two  countries -

15^th Mar. 2018-20%

Country field level technical support and reporting for second  two  countries-

30^th May -15%

Country field level technical support and reporting for last two countries-

30^th Jul 2018-15%

Training tool for reginal office-

30^th Sep 2018 -25%

Training report --

Final comparative analytical report----100%

Individual bidders for this work may propose to carry out some aspects of the work simultaneously or to undertake each aspect in sequence. The proposed work structure should be clearly outlined in the proposal.

 

REPORTING REQUIREMENTS:

Consultant will be requested to develop:

1. Submit comprehensive report with the key findings, success stories, lessons learned from the desk review before starting the field visits.
2. Develop evidence-based advocacy and communication brief for key actors to integrate gender in all strategic humanitarian planning and transition to recovery and development (targeting  UN, Donors, NGO and government partners)
3. Final comparative and analytical report and potential case studies documenting the initiative including institutional lessons learned at the end field missions.
4. Country specific technical support reports.
5. Final report covers the whole consultancy

 

TRAVEL CONSIDERATIONS: Mission travel

For individual contractors and consultants, all travel arrangements to commence the assignment, including insurance and visas, will be managed and paid by the individual.  Therefore, expected travel costs must be included as a budget item in the financial proposal.  Should “mission travel” be required, UNICEF will manage and pay for travel via Travel Authorization.  However, this will be subject to the following prerequisites:  Medical Clearance, Security Clearance through the Travel Request Information Process (TRIP) system, the Basic and Advanced Security in the Field Trainings, Travel Visa, and liability waiver. Trip prerequisites will be met at the expense of the consultant.

Travel cost shall be calculated based on economy class travel, regardless of the length of travel.  Costs for accommodation, meals and incidentals shall not exceed applicable daily subsistence allowance (DSA) rates, as promulgated by the International Civil Service Commission (ICSC at http://icsc.un.org).  The consultant must travel on UNICEF approved airlines.

 

Total missions required

Consultant will undertake at least eight missions as per following:

• One mission will be to Jordan to meet with the regional office around the end of phase one to present the preliminary desk review report to UNICEF Regional actors and key stakeholders. Mission duration 7days including travel.
• One mission at least to six of the following countries (Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Palestine) – mission length 23 days per country  including  travel
• One mission to Jordan during Phase  three to conduct the TOT training at RO level and review the final deliverables with Regional advisor and programme sections. Mission duration 14 days including travel

A schedule of missions will be organized based on the agreement of regional gender advisor, regional humanitarian advisor and country offices agreement.

 

QUALIFICATION REQUIREMENTS:

1.            Education:

• Master's degree in Law, International Development, International Relations, Sociology, Gender studies, Area Studies, or other relevant social sciences.

2.            Work experience:

• Minimum 8 years of professional experience in gender equality programming
• Minimum 3 years’ experience in outreach and analysis
• Minimum 7 years of experience in humanitarian action work

3.            Technical knowledge:

• Knowledge of the MENARO region
• Experience in conducting research on gender equality and women’s empowerment issues
• Familiarity with the Humanitarian System and Civil Society Organizations, and international organizations and NGOs in particular would be an asset
• Experience in capacity building, including design and implementation of trainings
• Ability to relate humanitarian affairs issues and perspectives particularly with a focus on gender equality, to political, economic, social and human rights programme
• Proven ability to work in a multi-cultural environment, establish and maintain effective working relationships, and meet deadlines is required
• A constructive attitude, flexible approach to changing circumstances and desire to help the organization learn are all essential to success in this consultancy
• Key competences, technical background, and experience required

4.            Language:

• Fluent in English
• Arabic/French languages would be an asset

Payment Schedule:

12. PROPOSED PAYMENT SCHEDULE

Proposed methodology:   By Deliverable

UNICEF will only make milestone payment based on achievement of specific deliverables as listed on the table above. These payments should be stated in terms of percentage.  Also note that UNICEF does not make advance payment except under certain conditions in line with UNICEF Financial Rules and Regulations.

 

EVALUATION PROCESS:

Qualified candidates are requested to submit:

1. Cover letter/application.
2. Financial quote as lump sum for professional fees, and lump sum for travel/administrative/subsistence, if applicable.
3. CV.
4. Examples of previous, relevant work as applicable
5. Proposed methodology/approach to managing the project.
6. At least 2 Referees
7. P 11 form (which can be downloaded from our website at http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/index_53129.html ).

Late submissions, incomplete packets, or submissions with an incorrect email subject heading will not be considered.

Please indicate your ability, availability and daily/monthly rate (in US$) to undertake the terms of reference above (including travel and daily subsistence allowance, if applicable).  Applications submitted without a daily/monthly rate will not be considered.